Storyteller (and the Story That Was Never Told)
by cinderrain
Summary: Widget is alone in the circus one night, and goes for a walk with Tsukiko in the Labyrinth. (Character study, no pairings. One-shot, complete.)


_A/N: This is an entry for a public-library hosted writing contest. Recently the results came out and this didn't make any of the places, so I decided to post it here. Please review and tell me what you think? (Word limit was 2000)_

**Storyteller (and the Story That Was Never Told)**

The circus is as lively tonight as any other, and, for once, Widget is alone. Poppet had run off somewhere with Bailey, and Widget had opted to stay behind - a choice he now regrets. He wanders through the circus, not sure exactly what to do without his sister there with him. He pauses to purchase a bag of popcorn, watching as the caramel drips through the gaps between the kernels with only the slightest hint of nostalgia. He wanders through the circus, stopping for a bit to watch the clock – there were stories in each and every one of the moving pieces, all of them fitting together into a whole- a dream, as it was made to be.

Widget eventually finds himself in front of the contortionist's display. As he joins the small crowd around her, he thinks back to Hector Bowen's comment - one that Widget had read off of Celia in order to piece the story together properly. (He still considers the story of the circus as the best one he's ever told – or ever will tell.) Watching Tsukiko now, he can't help but disagree with the wording of that particular sentence.

What she's doing now is much better described by something more _eloquent_ than "bending herself into knots". Then again, Widget is probably biased and unreasonably picky about describing with words. He is a teller of stories, after all.

When she pauses for her break, Tsukiko makes her way over to where the older Murray twin is standing. He did not expect her to approach him, but nonetheless it does not come as a surprise. He waits patiently while she lights and takes a drag from her cigarette, but can't help it when he blurts out a question that had been sitting on his mind ever since the last pieces of the circus' story had settled into place.

"Was it-" He cuts himself off, composing his words and his expression carefully. Tsukiko had never allowed him to read her, even for the purposes of gathering the full story. He doesn't know how she would react to the question. "Did your… opponent… give you the lighter?"

The only reply he receives is the friendly, enigmatic smile and an offer: "Would you like to walk with me?"

They make an unspoken decision to enter the Labyrinth. It is, after all, the embodiment of the 'game', the point where the players had become inseparably intertwined. Widget thinks that this tent in particular makes Tsukiko remember her own challenge and her own opponent, but he finds it impossible to tell if it pains her to do so.

They find their way through the first rooms in silence, though Widget allows Tsukiko to choose the doors. Oddly enough, the drifting feathers and sifting sand and the _snow_ all seem to be somehow farther away from the constant presence of the tent's creators. It is as if the contortionist knew where to find privacy, and there is a certain loneliness around that fact.

Widget is the first to break the silence.

There are too many gaps, and he knows that hers is a different story, separate in its entirety from the story of the Night Circus, but that magic around midnight had left him with more than a strange ability to read people. Stories awaken something of a hunger in him, in much the same way that Poppet suffers from headaches when the future is too complex to understand (when she doesn't _want_ to understand). He wants to know.

"It was your instructor who told me that stories are no longer simple," he begins, hoping that his tone is conversational and does not reveal his aching curiosity. People tend to hold on tighter to what they had if they knew how much it meant to the other person. "That they overlap, blur, become complicated."

They are standing in the playing-card hallway. Tsukiko pauses, looking up at the swaying card-lanterns, and Widget thinks she might be avoiding his gaze. When she turns back, however, it is with that cryptic smile and no verbal reply. Instead, she sweeps towards the spiraling iron stairs at the end of the hall, and cards on the wall flutter when Widget rushes to keep up.

Widget stops, frozen, when he realizes where they are. He recovers himself with a silent, shaky laugh and remembers Poppet's distress at not being able to immediately see her way out. His sister sees how things unravel, and he picks up the pieces left behind.

His female companion this time is considerably less moved by the lack of a clear exit. Instead, Tsukiko strolls slowly around the birdcage, running her fingers over the cool metal bars. Widget wonders if it reminds her of something from before (and suspects that she knows exactly where the hidden doors are, and where they lead).

"You mentioned, once, that the lighter was 'constructed by someone very dear' to you. You've also mentioned that your opponent was rather fond of fire."

"You pay much attention to details." It isn't said in the way of a compliment, but it isn't an answer either. Widget removes the key from the swing and climbs to the Sphinx's temple before dropping back and letting Tsukiko lead again. She chooses a door that leads into a room with an array of frozen books, suspended in midair.

"You were water and she was fire. Why does the rain avoid you now?" Widget can't help but be distracted from his relentless questioning by the books, and he reaches a hand out to the closest one to see if there are words inside.

"What are you looking for?" Widget doubts that Tsukiko is talking about the books. "What do you want from me?" There is not even the slightest hint of accusation in the words, and quiet curiosity is present – perhaps accompanied by amusement.

Widget isn't sure how to answer that. He wants her story – the story of her 'challenge'. _What_ is clear enough, but it is _why_ that he's stuck on. To satisfy that inexplicable thirst for stories? Because hers is the only one that stuck out so obviously, so much missing from it, a story in its own right?

"You play by your own rules," Widget replies, settling with paraphrasing Marco's words to Bailey. Though she can't have known – he had only told the circus story in its entirety to Alexander – Tsukiko responds with a knowing smile.

"_You_ play by everyone else's."

"What do you mean?" All thoughts of pressing her with further questions are dropped. He can recognize the heart of a story when he sees one, even when it is only five words long. She steps a little closer, the pages rustling like leaves, and Widget realizes that his hand is still laid (almost protectively) over the book he was about to look at. The paper had warmed under his hand, and the open pages are now smoothed flat.

"You play by the rules set down by everyone else." Widget wonders dimly when she had taken the time to put out her cigarette, and then is glad that she had – the books would have been in danger of setting alight. "You play secondary character to even your sister. You are a master of weaving spoken tales, but now you only parrot others' words back at me."

"I'm trying to find your story," he protests weakly, and he knows. He knows what she's getting at, and he thinks that he probably won't like it much.

"Where is _your _story, Widget?" Widget thinks that maybe she's angry at him for prying, but by now she is close enough for him to see each individual tattoo on her pale skin. The look in her eyes tells him that she's trying to help, just as she was trying to help when she had told Celia that Marco didn't love her. As she had been trying to help when she wanted to seal Marco in the bonfire (alone).

"I don't know." The admission takes a bit out of him, surprisingly enough, because he's always known that he doesn't know.

"You're right. I am the only one in the circus who carries a tale entirely separate from the venue for this challenge. I am not as entangled in the circus as others, which is how I 'play by my own rules'. You, however, can't afford a story separate from the reason for your entire existence." Tsukiko plucks a book from its hovering position and casually sets it aflame with her lighter. While the flames flicker without smoke, burning without any visible damage to the book, she continues.

"You were born with the lighting of the bonfire. You are as much a part of the circus as the fire or the clock, though perhaps not as much as those two." The contortionist waves a hand in a gesture that clearly is meant as referring to Marco and Celia, all the while not taking her eyes off of the flaming book. It seems as though she's trying to find someone in the warm glow – someone whose skin smelled of ginger and cream.

"You never played a crucial part in the circus' story." Tsukiko looks up at him, directly in the eyes, and her gaze softens marginally. "Poppet would have won over Bailey without your help. Everyone else too deeply involved with the circus to have their own story be of much more importance was crucial to its creation, upkeep, or revival." There is a pause, but then she continues.

"Did you keep to your role as a minor character on purpose?"

"I'm the one who tells the stories." He can't tell if it's agreement or a protest.

"And a storyteller is not allowed one of his own?" The fire goes out, and the room is considerably darker (strange, as it had seemed well-lit enough when they had come in) as Widget contemplates this.

"You're remarkably similar to your instructor, you know," he remarks, putting off answering the question. He wonders if this is what Tsukiko feels like, with her cryptic statements meant to misdirect.

Widget starts walking again, suddenly desperate to escape the room with the frozen books and stories forever untold. They emerge into a room filled with sand, the night sky stretching above them, and the stars twinkling. It makes Widget miss his twin.

"What would you do," Tsukiko said quietly, "if I let you read me?"

Widget was startled into blinking several times. "_Would_ you let me?" She smiles, this time a little sad, and shakes her head.

"I…" He wants to lie and say that he doesn't know, but he does, and Tsukiko can tell when he lies, anyway. "I'll go looking for the next story, I suppose."

"Do you enjoy it?" The contortionist asks after a pause. "Finding and telling stories," she elaborates when her question is met with confused silence.

"Yes." There is a great deal less hesitation in his voice than any of his previous questions and answers before, because this he knows.

"Would you move on to the next story if I refused to tell you?"

"No." Some part of Widget knows he shouldn't be rude, and that Poppet would scold him if she were here, but he wants to be honest, and Poppet isn't here.

Tsukiko only smiles again and lights her cigarette, but Widget feels an odd sense of closure.

It's only when they have long parted ways, and Widget is waiting to meet up with Bailey and Poppet again, when he realizes: he came away from that meeting with nothing at all new about Tsukiko, but quite a bit about himself.


End file.
